We are 2 weeks old now!

Day 13 - May 16, 2007

Our Tails of Hans Christian Anderson are definitely progressing now and this morning, when the 4 kids were awake, the were all attempting to climb down the ramp which naturally horrifies me at this young age. Now just try and picture it right, all 4 are clinging on for grim death as they attempt to climb down "Everest", then along comes "Giant Hands" and the babies are suddenly lifted up off their little Everest and put at the very back of the box. Now while Giant Hands are putting 2 of them at the back of the box, the other 2 continue the seemingly long descent, those 2 are then picked up, and are also put at the back of the box, but by this time, the first 2 babies have started going back down Everest again. I just can not win! Fortunately though, I have much more determination than they do at this age, but I reckon in a weeks' time, they will all be all over the floor exploring at this rate. Can you imagine though what must be going through their little minds, they put so much effort into descending Everest, and the Giant Hands just appear from nowhere and effortlessly pick them up and next thing they know, they are back where they started from. I wonder if they wonder how on earth this happens but so long as they don't associate Giant Hands with me, it will be okay ;)

Day 12 - May 15, 2007

Snow Queen is trying to follow in Liquorices' paw prints and yesterday afternoon, she kept trying to climb down the ramp so she can join her as she runs around the room. It really is quite funny because Snow Queen isn't even at this stage yet where she can walk properly, let alone run around. I keep picking her up off the ramp and putting her back in the box. I really am quite enamoured with our Siamese girls as they are so sweet and they will be the last Chocolate Point Siamese kittens we have now until next year, that's if we ever have any more, so they are pretty special little girls. I did manage to take some individual photos today of our babies although they are not particularly great ones but it does give you an idea of what they actually look like. They are darlings aren't they? :)

Day 11 - May 14, 2007

As each day passes, our Tails of Hans Christian Anderson are becoming more and more alert, and more and more active. When they are awake now, once they're finished feeding, instead of just going back to sleep, they are crawling/walking all around their kitten box now. Little Tuk has actually made a few attempts to walk down the ramp. Of course each time I see him try this I pick him up and put him right at the back of the kitten box because I really do not want any of them out of the box at this age. Their weights continue to be perfectly acceptable and their features are becoming so much more clearer now. I'm hoping either tomorrow or the next day, I will find the time to take some individual photos of them so that our diary readers know which baby is which.

Day 10 - May 13, 2007

Sharing 2 mum's means that our Tails of Hans Christian Anderson are making even bigger weight gains than they would normally so I am really thrilled about this. All 4 of the children are thriving and they are starting to take a much bigger interest in what is going on around them. They are also much more alert when it comes to be handled or stroked and when I lie on the floor in front of the box and chat to the babies, they try to edge closer to try to figure out just who I am exactly and what all the fuss is about. I'm still convinced our 2 Siamese girls are Chocolate Points which is quite nice as I think that Chocolate Points are such a lovely colour. When I was rearranging the kitten room yesterday afternoon, I did spent a lot of time watching the Tails of Hans Christian Anderson to see how they were coping with Liquorice who is so much larger than them. Despite Liquorice giving them "bear hugs", and walking across them, none of the babies have any problems with her and there certainly is no danger of being squashed because even at this very young age, I have seen the Tails of Hans Christian Anderson, simply wriggle out from underneath Liquorice with great ease on those occasions when she has flopped down on top of them.

Day 9 - May 12, 2007

Both entries start off exactly the same today.................

Yesterday afternoon, we had to go to the vets with our old dog Sabre. She is 16 years old now and needed a check up and new medication for her arthritis. We also went to Tesco while we were out. Anyway, we came back, put the shopping away, made a coffee, fed all the feline family, I then went into the kitchen to prepare a meal for Drambuie and a meal for the 2 mum's. I took the meal up to the kitten room, opened the door, and stared in horror at the posh box which should have had Sami's babies in there, but it didn't, there was no one in there at all. Instantly I knew what had happened, so I turned around and sure enough, both Sambuca and Cointreau were coming out of Cointreau's box, and inside Cointreau's box was: Liquorice, Little Tuk, Ugly Ducking, Ice Maiden, and Snow Queen. Now fair enough, I knew at some point that the mum's would just join ranks and raise the babies together but they have at least had the gratitude to have all shared them in the posh box, rather than Cointreau's old cardboard box. What on earth I am going to say to Tone and Teen I do not know. Actually, I made the decision when I discovered all the babies together, that if they remained together until today, and there were no incidences, then I would move the cardboard box out of the room altogether, leaving just the posh box, then they will have no choice but to all use the posh box :) They do look funny together because Liquorice is so much bigger obviously than Sami's 2 Black children and I shall be watching carefully to ensure no one is trod on, squashed, and that everyone is still getting a nipple. Although 5 babies between 2 mums should have no problems at all finding a spare nipple! Oh, and on a totally different note, Caryll sent me an email yesterday telling me how to sort out the scales so that I wouldn't have to subtract the total weight from the container. All I had to do was put the container on the scales and then set them to "0". So yep, I'm feeling rather silly for not realising this before :) Now onto our individual entries...........

I am relieved to see that the "house move" has had no effect on the Tails of Hans Christian Anderson. Despite sharing the same box with Sami and Liquorice for the past 24 hours, they still made very good weight gains. Now that I know this, I have now removed the cardboard box from the kitten room and everyone is all now in the posh box. The only difference is that the front of the box which converts to a ramp (isn't Tone a genius :) He was thinking ahead to the time when the babies would reach 3 weeks of age and want to explore and obviously they couldn't go through the opening their mum uses, so instead, they just go up and down the ramp), is now permanently down because whilst the Tails of Hans Christian Anderson are not at the stage where they will climb out of the box, Liquorice definitely wants to go in and out. Of course, I have been popping up to the kitten room every half hour so far today, just to ensure that no one has rolled down the ramp :)

Day 8 - May 11, 2007

The latest news updates on our Tails of Hans Christian Anderson is that Ice Maiden now has both eyes fully open, and Snow Queen has her right eye fully open and her left eye half open. I really am delighted to see that all babies eyes have opened up clear without any problems at all. All 4 of our babies made very good weight gains during the last 24 hours, better in fact, that the weight gain that Liquorice made, and he is the only one in his litter, go figure! The babies really are thriving and it is such a huge relief to see them doing so incredibly well. They are happy little babies (some not so little) and at this stage of their lives, all they want is warmth, milk, and their mummy. They are very good about being weighed though, which reminds me....................guess what? I finally got round to getting digital scales (from Argos). Am I happy with them? Nope, not at all. I think I bought the wrong ones! The ones I bought have a slightly rounded stainless steel top which means I can not just put the babies on the scales as they are. It would be too cold for them and they would fall off. So I still have to put them in a container, I have to know what the container weighs, and I then have to subtract the container weight from the total weight once the baby is on the scales <sigh> What does Graham say when I told him about it..................."I told you to buy the other ones but noooooooooo you didn't want to spend that much money on a pair of scales!" He's right of course. :) Still, I will persevere with them and see how I get on.

Day 7 - May 10, 2007

It's hard to believe that already our Tails of Hans Christian Anderson are a week old. Both our Black babies now have their eyes fully open, whereas our Siamese babies are starting to show signs of opening their eyes so I am thinking in a few days time all of our babies will be able to see the world. Today I had another look at sexes/colours and I also made a start on the weight charts and now that is up to date, I have the weekly weight gains for our babies. Overall I am happy with the weekly gains that each baby has made. So with everything I have looked at today, this is where we stand at the moment............

Baby	Colour	Sex	Weekly Weight Gain
Little Tuk	Oriental Black	Female	88 grams
Ugly Duckling	Oriental Black	Male	112 grams
Ice Maiden	Chocolate Point Siamese	Female	95 grams
Snow Queen	Chocolate Point Siamese	Female	56 grams

The thing I am still uncertain of at the moment is Ice Maiden's sex and I would not be surprised at all to discover that she, is in a fact, a he. Time will tell though.